July 2nd: Western Explorer Trip With Friends!

My Orca Behavior Institute partner Michael and I both had lots of friends and family coming into town for the 4th of July holiday weekend, so I booked a whale watch charter on the Western Explorer, the zodiac I used to work on. Since some visitors didn't make it in time for the trip, I invited some other whale friends along, and we ended up going out with an awesome group of people!

All geared up for the Western Explorer

It also turned out to be the perfect opportunity to get a photo of "Team OBI". While we've gotten some generous financial support at the Orca Behavior Institute, we've also had several friends volunteer their time and skills to help us out. You can read a bit more about some of our team members on the newest page on our website. 

Team OBI - Back row from left to right: Brittany, Keith, Cindy, Sara, and Julie. Front row: Yours truly and OBI co-founder Michael.

While we all enjoy educating the public about the whales and other local wildlife, we also enjoy the chance to "fake naturalize" among ourselves, when we get to make up all the fake answers we're sometimes tempted to give to tourist questions. For now I'll leave those questions and answers to your imagination ;)

On our way out to the whales we went by the smoldering Goose Island, a Nature Conservancy Preserve that was accidentally set on fire by illegal fireworks. After two attempts to put it out, the local fire fighters decided to let it burn itself out, as the fire had gotten into the ground and with the dry conditions and local winds was proving almost impossible to fully extinguish. (It was also a forewarning of what was to come: on July 5th we woke up to bizarre hazy brown skies caused by an abundance of local wildfires that rendered the outside world a living sepia photograph.) Amazingly, while many nests were destroyed, several gull chicks survived and other nests were still occupied. Same with the black oystercatchers and pelagic cormorants, showing their resilience in a still-burning landscape. While the double-crested cormorant nests didn't burn, they did appear to abandon all breeding efforts for this season.

Smoldering Goose Island

Out in the straits, we stopped to check out a pair of minke whales before heading towards the orcas. I don't get to see these guys as much as I used to, so it was fun to get a close look at them again. I sent my sightings to the Northeast Pacific Minke Whale Project - you can do the same with any of your minke whale sightings! They don't get out on the water as much as they would like, so citizen science reports really help their studies. They think the whale in the first photo is a young animal, perhaps even a young of the year.

Up near False Bay, just as the evening lighting was getting golden, we came across the orcas.

The first group of whales we saw was the J2s.

J37 Hy'shqa

J2 Granny

Next up were the J2s' favorite travel companions of the summer: the K14s.

K26 Lobo

One thing that's great about having the camera out to photograph whales is the other photo ops you get along the way - like this common murre.

The whales foraged close to shore for a while as we watched them from offshore.

K26 Lobo and Mt. Baker

Before it was time to leave, the whales pulled offshore and started milling around closer to us.

Another shot of a common murre - this one being startled by an orca

There's absolutely nothing better than sunset whales:

All in all it was a great evening out with friends, and a beautiful ride back to the harbor.

Washington State Ferry heading into Friday Harbor

Lots of Spring Walks, Lots of Spring Sightings

Last week Wednesday I got to check on the owlets again with my friend Katie (check out her blog for some awesome owl pics!). It's amazing how much they grew in just one week!

We watched them from a distance for about 10 minutes, and the cutest moment was when this little guy stretched, looking more like a slinky toy than a baby owl:

On Friday, a walk at the Friday Harbor Labs turned up my first singing olive-sided flycatcher (174) and also a western tanager (175) and another barred owl. A non-avian highlight was this very cooperative butterfly:

On Saturday, we spent the afternoon at another friend's house. I enjoyed exploring around her yard, where in an hour I saw/heard about 20 bird species. Here's the view from her back porch:

One bird highlight were the pine siskins. They were loooovvvviiinng the thistle seed feeders:

But my favorite birds to watch were by far the two pairs of rufous hummingbirds, that showed no fear of me sitting right below the feeders. That allowed for some great photographic opportunities. Here's a male, just landing and holding onto the perch:

And here's a female hovering near the feeder, my favorite photo of the week:

While watching her feeders, I also saw my first black-headed grosbeak (176) of the year. We then went for a walk, and along her driveway was some striped coralroot (Corallorhiza striata), the first time I've seen this particular species of flowering plant that gets its nutrients not through photosynthesis but off fungi in the soil:

Nearby was the spotted coralroot (Corallorhiza maculata), the species I see more often:

On the walk, I heard several Wilson's warblers (177), as well as more olive-sided and Pacific-slope flycatchers, a mourning dove, and a band-tailed pigeon,  the latter two being more uncommon species here.

Sunday a hike near Roche Harbor gave me a chance to stop by the marina and see the purple martins (178) that are taking advantage of the nest boxes there. Finally, during a walk after work today, I heard my first Swainson's thrush (179) of the year. Meanwhile, Dave's been ticking away over in the UK, and despite my productive California trip in February sits only 7 species back in our year list competition!

A Day At Lime Kiln Point State Park

June 2003

I had just graduated high school and was a couple weeks into my new research internship at The Whale Museum. I was settling into my regular routine of heading to Lime Kiln Point State Park every morning, where another intern and I would spend mornings in what was informally known as the "acoustics shed". We would plug headphones into a pair of dusty old computers and analyze recordings made on the park's hydrophones, assessing both sound quality and identifying specific vocalizations made by the Southern Resident killer whales. It was these many hours spend in the acoustics shed where I learned how to identify all the discrete calls. Occasionally one or the other of us would pull off the headphones and we would discuss the nuances of a particular call type. Is this an S7, or an S12? Why?

At midday a researcher from another project would come in to get weather data off our computers, and this was cue that it was time for lunch. We would all congregate at a picnic table to eat sandwiches, chips, and fruit. There were five or six of us spending our summers at the lighthouse, and we were periodically joined by a rotating cast of other characters: visiting friends and family, whale aficionados from elsewhere on the island, or visitors who came to the park hoping to see the whales. Some of these visitors, we learned, made annual pilgrimage to Lime Kiln from Seattle, or California, or Texas, or Holland. We became an informal whale community, swapping stories of past whale encounters and looking over photo ID guides, discussing how to identify certain whales that had more generic saddle patches.

The warm afternoon sunshine made it too pleasant to go back into the acoustics shed. Instead, we'd start a game of chess, while others played cards (if it wasn't too windy), or found a place to rest on the rocks and read a book or nap. Eventually, someone would get up to scan the horizon, and when the telltale sign of red and yellow zodiacs was seen, we would drop everything else and spring into action. Some of the other researchers would grab clipboards, data sheets, and ID guides. I would go into the lighthouse to start the hydrophone recording, make a few quick notes about the date, time, and direction of travel, then grab my camera and head down to my favorite rock: low to the water and right in front of the lighthouse. Soon we would see spouts, then dorsal fins, and I would start snapping photos - photography was new to me; in years past, I had shot only video. When the whales passed in front of us we would call back and forth to each other on the rocks, trying to ID each family group as they swam by....

Whale-watching from Lime Kiln in 2003 - that's me on "my rock", closest to the water, in the blue shirt with the camera

June 2011

I walk down the familiar trail to the lighthouse with my camera, backpack, and lunch. The morning calm hasn't yet left the water and when I see one of the researchers he tells me that half of J-Pod went north a few hours earlier. That's okay: I hope to see the whales, but mostly I wan to come and spend a whole day sitting at the lighthouse. It's something I haven't done much of in recent years.

The summer of 2003 was my first of five years interning for The Whale Museum. The call types I learned helped me write my undergraduate thesis on killer whale vocal communication. I continued with photography, and published a book of orca photographs in 2007. These last few years, working full time as a naturalist on a whale watch tour boat, were fulfilling in some ways, but also left something lacking. I've stepped away from working as a naturalist this season, and I'm re-evaluating my direction in life. I didn't go on to get a Masters degree in bioacoustics as I foresaw as a new high school graduate. I don't work on the boats anymore, despite so many people telling me that was the perfect job for me. But I'm still here, at Lime Kiln, waiting for whales. Some things haven't changed.

Pigeon guillemots taking off

Eight Canada geese in Haro Strait

I don't have to sit on the rocks long this morning before a couple of people I know walk up. We sit and look at the birds fishing in the ebb tide. A seal pops up in the kelp with a salmon and we pull out our cameras. My friends move on, and I find another place to lay on the rocks and start a new book. As the sun warms up I pull out my lunch and eat it while watching dragonflies and swallowtail butterflies, listening to nothing but the sound of the gentle waves.

Just when I'm starting to think about heading home to the chores that await me there, someone calls out, "Monika, we've got whales!" Out of nowhere, the other half of J-Pod is upon us, in a rare mid-day June moment of being unaccompanied by the commercial whale watch fleet. I immediately recognize J34 Doublestuf and pull out my camera as strangers gather on the rocks above me.

J34 Doublestuf

The whales quickly pass by, with a few tailslaps and distant breaches, and most of the tourists are gone. I walk around to the other side of the lighthouse and am surprised to see that I know almost all the people sitting there, and have known them for five or even ten years. Bob, the researcher. Billy, the park ranger. Wendy and Megan, the mother and daughter who make annual visits here. Diane, who used to intern for Bob, and now lives on the island. Mary, the volunteer naturalist.

Like the whales that just passed by, there have been some changes in our whale community over the last eight years. J11 Blossom has passed away. I haven't spoken to my fellow acoustic intern from 2003 since that last late summer evening. J28 Polaris has a new knick in her dorsal fin and a small calf in tow. Diane is now married with a brand new puppy. J22 Oreo is a familiar presence, the same as ever. So is Bob, the summer resident researcher collecting data on the boats and whales as they pass the lighthouse.

Diane's new English cream golden retriever puppy - Maddy

There's something grounding to me about spending a full day at Lime Kiln. I spent more than seven hours there yesterday, something I haven't done in years. I got sunburned. I read half a book. I ate a picnic lunch. I talked with old friends. I just sat and looked - there's never nothing to look it.

A pair of oystercatchers that flew by while I sat on the rocks at Lime Kiln

It was awesome.